Ketamine – small doses work in depression and bipolar disorder

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Everyone is very edgy right now with depression. Media is sensationalizing, which is the worst thing to do. I even hesitate to write this now.

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Ketamine really does work

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Small doses may be all that’s needed. Even large doses are safe.

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Two Cases

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I hate to play on emotion that is strong right now, but Robin Williams might be alive today if his doctors prescribed ketamine nasal spray.

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Every one, doctors and patients alike, worry about ketamine. It sells newspaper headlines and distorted media coverage that then overtakes the life saving stories of its profound safety when used under good medical supervision. Experience helps.

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Two cases from yesterday and today really must be shared. These two patients would not be alive today if they did not have ketamine nasal spray for their depression.

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I don’t mean to say every one will respond to these extremely tiny doses, but it’s always exciting to hear the effective dose is simply so small.

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These details would make good case reports if time permitted, but there is never enough time. I wanted simply to say a few things now because these two patients were seen.

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**1**

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In May 2014, saw a fifty-ish woman who is now responding to 20 mg (4 nasal sprays) given as one dose every 48 hours. She has been treated at well known university psychiatry departments, failed ECT 9 or 10 times – memory loss was so bad she got lost in her own neighborhood. Received IV ketamine once or twice weekly for one year before I saw her.

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Diagnoses: dysthymia as long as she can remember, and 25 years of Major Depressive Disorder, PTSD, anxiety, etc. Olympic level athlete —

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**2**

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Second patient now in late teens, Juvenile Bipolar Disorder/Fear of Harm phenotype, profound thermoregulatory changes respond in seconds to ketamine, dose of 10 mg nasal spray every 3 days. That’s it! Temperature responds in seconds, and the depression responds in 10 minutes in her case. She was so violent before treatment that she had been hospitalized 7 times in 2-1/2 years. Doing very very well. And the low dose naltrexone, by the way, is involved in thermoregulation.

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I should mention, no side effects whatsoever. I have never seen toxicity. I watch kidney and bladder function meticulously, and patients with massive pain on very high doses have never had any organ toxicity.

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NEURO-INFLAMMATION AND GLIA – brain on fire.

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I mention Olympic athlete because so many people I see with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome – the pain that so often leads to suicide, seems to occur more often in top level athletes, either state or national level, professional or sponsored in their teens. Yes, they occur in others, but there is a striking predominance in athletes for unknown reasons.

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Glia are triggered by trauma, then they become activated and produce pro-inflammatory cytokines. Inflammation is out of balance. Ketamine profoundly reduces the pro-inflammatory cytokines, and so does low dose naltrexone. I write about these mechanisms with more frequency that anything else. This is what we must address – the brain is essentially “on fire.” And this inflammation, these pro-inflammatory cytokines, are involved in almost every known disease: Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, ALS, chronic pain, major depressive disorder, cancer, autoimmune disease, and atheroscloerosis.

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Inflammation kills. Unfortunately this new research on glia and inflammatory diseases, these diseases could be called gliopathies, all based on new research since the turn of the century. We now know glia are your innate immune system in brain and spinal cord. They need a balance the anti-inflammatory cytokines with the pro-inflammatory cytokines. Inflammation may be lifesaving when you have caught a virus, but not as a steady diet. Give the brain a break or it leads to hyperexcitable glutamate that triggers calcium flooding into the neuron, cell death, brain atrophy and memory loss. Seen in people with Major Depression and those with chronic low back pain.

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Do doctors know about the innate immune system? or the receptor that won the Nobel Prize 2 and 1/2 years ago? or glia?

Ketamine administration was associated with a substantial reduction in measures of mania, fear of harm and aggression. Significant improvement was observed in mood, anxiety and behavioral symptoms, attention/executive functions, insomnia, parasomnias and sleep inertia. Treatment was generally well-tolerated.

for Bipolar Disorder. And I add, ketamine is off-label for pain and for major depression.

He posts this:

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PUBLIC WARNING

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Public Warning: Ketamine is a controlled substance.

Administered improperly, or without the guidance of a qualified doctor,

Ketamine may cause injury or death.

No attempt should be made to use Ketamine

in the absence of counsel from a qualified doctor.

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“Off label” means it is FDA approved for another purpose, but he prescribes it for Juvenile Bipolar Disorder. I would add that in qualified hands, ketamine is one of the safest medications we have in our formulary.

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More later, as time permits.

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PUBLIC WARNING

reprinted with permission of Demitri Papolos, MD.
Ketamine is a controlled substance.
Administered improperly, or without the guidance of a qualified doctor,
Ketamine may cause injury or death.
No attempt should be made to use Ketamine
in the absence of counsel from a qualified doctor..